


Love Comes With a Knife

by Shadaras



Category: Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018), Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Bloodplay, Dubious Consent, Eldritch Force, F/F, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Masturbation, Mind Reading, Sith Training, Telepathic Exhibitionism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-23
Updated: 2019-08-23
Packaged: 2020-07-28 20:15:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20069929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadaras/pseuds/Shadaras
Summary: After Bespin, the Alliance is in desperate straits: It has scrambled from one too many planets, left behind a few too many goods, and now there's nothing left to do but beg. Leia Organa talks her way into a meeting with the leader of Crimson Dawn, hoping to bargain for the resources her beloved Alliance desperately needs — but she doesn't know the price she will be asked to pay.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spacewitchescantdie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacewitchescantdie/gifts).

> I hope you enjoy reading this story as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> (Thank you also to my beta for helping me see where in this story I needed to expand some things so that everything got out of my head and onto the page.)

It was the right coordinates. Leia looked up at the tower-shaped barge that R2-D2 had helped her fly to, and wished, not for the first time, that the terms of this meeting allowed her to bring even one other person. She had Artoo, but no matter how smart he was, it wasn’t as comforting as having someone whose hand she could hold, who would tell her something other than “I told you so”, even if what they said was a lie.

Lando had warned her, but she hadn’t taken his warning seriously enough, it seemed. Leia swallowed her fear, steadied herself with pride, and opened a comm channel. “This is Leia Organa, piloting _Hydenock_. I have a meeting.”

“_Hydenock_, this is _First Light_. Transmitting docking procedures now.” The voice sounded automated. That meant very little, other than that Crimson Dawn didn’t see any reason to broadcast their intentions through the vagaries of organic speech.

Artoo warbled at her as he brought _Hydenock_ down to land. Leia sighed, and laid a hand on his dome. “Stay here,” she told him. It wasn’t the most helpful instruction to give him, she’d learned, but she had to try. “If I don’t return, I’m sure you can find a way to get a message back to everyone else and lead a rescue.”

This time, his beeps had a distinctly accusing tone, even if she couldn’t understand Binary. But he stayed put as she walked down the ramp and out of the little T-1 shuttle. The landing bay was barren. Leia wasn’t surprised by that; she wouldn’t have asked anyone she thought might be untrustworthy to land in a well-travelled area either. One door was lit up brightly, luminous in the otherwise-dim room, and Leia swallowed and looked back to reassure herself that the red-and-white shuttle was still there before she approached.

The door opened as she neared it, revealing a turbolift. Leia sighed, adjusted her cloak, and stepped inside. The lift door closed, and it began sliding smoothly up. There were buttons, Leia observed, but none of them were depressed or lit up or otherwise indicating where she was going. She suspected that if she touched them, nothing would happen. Whoever she was meeting with (_Qi’ra_, she reminded herself. _Lando said her name was Qi’ra._) was clearly sparing no effort to ensure that Leia would not be in control.

Leia told herself she didn’t need to be in control.

Her breath speeding up was nerves, and she could pace her lungs if she chose. Her need to pace around the lift as it moved (slowly, so slowly) was to make sure she didn’t get stiff, and to help release the nerves. The fact that her fingers were trembling and something in the back of her head was whispering _This is a bad idea_ was just because she was alone, and she hadn’t been alone in years. Nothing more.

Certainly the sense of foreboding that knotted her stomach and thickened her tongue was nothing more than the memory of Darth Vader, coming unbidden to her head. Leia swore, clenching her hands into fists, and held herself absolutely still in the center of the lift. She was a princess, a senator, and a ranking member of the Rebel Alliance High Council. She would not let some _smuggler_ get the better of her, especially when she hadn’t even seen a face. She had her pride.

So she kept herself there, counting heartbeats to keep both heart and lungs from racing, eyes fixed on the door because there was no indication of how fast or slow she was going, and it wouldn’t do to give satisfaction by showing her nerves. The longer she stood, the more she straightened her spine, face drawing still into the senatorial mask she had needed to perfect under the Emperor’s nose. Her name was Leia Organa and she would not be brought to her knees.

The lift dinged, softly, melodically, and the doors opened into a lushly carpeted room. It was large; Leia was sure of that much. She was sure of very little else, because all the lights were off, and the lift’s illumination only reached so far across the deep red floor. Leia didn’t let herself break composure to scowl, but she wanted to. Instead, she took another breath and stepped out, footsteps silent on the wine-dark floor. The lift doors hissed closed behind her, and Leia was certain that it had descended once more, now that she had left it.

Leia took two more steps forward, to the edge of where she had once been able to see, and then stopped. She could hear nothing but the quiet hum of life support systems, background noise no spacer ever truly listened to anymore. She gathered herself, silenced the part of her mind that was trying to scream, and spoke into the silence: “My name is—”

“I know who you are, Leia Organa.”

In the darkness, the voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Part of Leia appreciated the effect, and wished she had the resources to pull it off. The rest of her, the primal part that she always wanted to tame, wanted a target; whether to run from or snarl at, she wasn’t quite sure.

“Then you have me at an advantage.” Leia kept her voice steady out of long years of practice.

Laughter rolled around her, rich and deep. Leia bit her lip. She did not want to think about how the primal part of her was already starting to offer a third reaction to this voice. Instead, she focused on the words echoing around her: “My name is Qi’ra. You knew that already, Leia, didn’t you?” Something touched Leia’s shoulder, and she jerked away, stumbling in the darkness. As Qi’ra continued, Leia realised it had been a hand. “My name will not be relevant to you. I am the Lady of the Crimson Dawn, she who rose from nothing to rule, and you may call me _Ma’am_.”

Leia glared in the direction the touch had come from. “Qi’ra,” she enunciated, very clearly. “I am here as an emissary from the Alliance to Restore the Republic. I was told we would have a _meeting_. This is not a meeting; this is a farce. I am not here to play _games_ with you.”

“All of life is a game,” Qi’ra said, voice suddenly serious. “I am simply out to win. And you did not listen to me the first time, Leia: I said you would call me _Ma’am_.”

Two hands, this time, pressed to her shoulders, and a sharp kick to the backs of her knees. Leia fell to the floor, and as she pushed herself back up to her knees with a growl, the lights turned on, blinding her.

“Sithspit,” Leia hissed. She blinked, and tried to stand up, but she couldn’t. Something—not a hand—pressed her down, keeping her on her knees. It felt like—

“Language,” Qi’ra said, and now Leia could see her. She stood just out of Leia’s reach, and she was not a tall woman; Leia wasn’t sure which of them would be taller, were they both standing. Probably Qi’ra, but mostly because she was wearing red-gold spike-heeled shoes that Leia suspected were designed to be weapons in a practical sense as well as an article of intimidation.

The rest of her outfit was designed along similar lines: Blood-red dress with shining red-gold accents, hugging her body to accentuate her curves but with more than enough space for exquisitely fine body-armor underneath, as well as layering that had to conceal at least one weapon. Red-gold cuffs spiralled along her forearms, which looked like they held personal shields, and possibly also daggers. Her earrings seemed to just be the sigil of the Crimson Dawn, but Leia wouldn’t be surprised if they, too, held secrets. The crown encircling Qi’ra’s head, however, broke the color scheme: It was black, so dark that it seemed to draw light into it, and had three dark gems set within it.

Qi’ra stepped forward to draw one sharp nail (blood-red, rose-gold fleur-de-lis atop it) across Leia’s cheek. “I know you are here for a meeting. And I have met you.”

Leia stared up at her and let the full force of her anger drive her upwards. Slowly—and from Qi’ra’s face, unexpectedly—she rose to her feet. As predicted, Qi’ra stood slightly taller. That didn’t matter. It never had before, and Leia was not going to allow it to start mattering now. “What about _negotiations_?” she asked, spitting the words out. She grabbed at Qi’ra’s wrist, pulling it away from her face. “I wish to make a deal. I was led to believe that you honored those.”

“I make deals on _my_ terms,” Qi’ra snapped. She pulled her wrist away from Leia and stepped back in the same motion.

Leia kept herself standing, even as the whole pressure of the room seemed to squeeze down on her. “You’re a Sith,” she heard herself saying. “Is that how you control everyone?”

“No, it’s because I’m very good at what I do,” Qi’ra snarled. “How do you know about the Sith?”

“You said you know who I am,” Leia said, buoyed by how off-balance Qi’ra seemed. “How do you think I know?”

Qi’ra stared into her eyes, and Leia met them squarely. Qi’ra’s eyes were dark blue, shot through with green and gold, and if they weren’t set in the face of a notorious crime lord, Leia would have called them beautiful. As it was, she just thought it, and kept the thought squarely to herself. Qi’ra’s lips twitched, and then they parted into the kind of smile Leia was used to seeing from politicians who thought they knew how to get exactly what they wanted.

“The Sith Lord Maul trained me,” Qi’ra said, and the pressure vanished, as if it had never been. “Come, sit with me at my table, Leia Organa, and I will offer you a deal.”

With a wave of her hand, Qi’ra opened a door Leia hadn’t seen. Behind it, there was indeed a well-appointed table set for two. It was piled high with fruit Leia hadn’t tasted since— Since before the Rebellion had started running, and she suspected the wine and pastries were just as rarified. She hesitated a moment, and then said, “I would be honored to join you at your table. Is the food to admire, or to eat?”

Qi’ra smile didn’t falter as she led the way. “I was planning on having a bite or two. You may as well.”

“Thank you,” Leia said. She sat, with all the manners she had been taught since birth, and waited until Qi’ra was seated as well before pouring a cup of wine for each of them. Qi’ra’s expression softened slightly at the gesture, but returned to being just as predatory as they each, in silence, picked a few delicacies for their plate.

Qi’ra held up a round pastry so delicate and flakey that Leia almost expected it to fall apart in her hand. “My chef is quite talented. Not many can make a Valyrian Lantern strong enough to be held, yet delicate enough to see the cherry through.”

“You have the resources to acquire the best,” Leia said. She felt her face tighten as she added, “I do not blame you for doing so.”

“You _were_ raised royal, Leia. Did you not have the same?”

Leia looked down at her plate. If she just looked at her plate, it might be tea-time back in Aldera City, with her parents quizzing her on local politics. “We did not acquire resources in quite the same way,” she said, instead of what she really felt.

“No?”

Leia kept her mouth closed on the phrase _Bribery and diplomacy are not the same_, and swallowed _Hereditary monarchy is not like taking over from the predecessor you killed_. Instead she looked up and said, merely, “I believe more of our dealings were matters of public record.”

Qi’ra laughed, and Leia was reminded of how the first time she’d heard that laugh she’s almost wanted to kiss it. She was no less uneasy with the idea now that she could see Qi’ra’s face, but now that they were facing each other over a meal instead of through darkness it seemed almost possible. Especially when Qi’ra leaned in, and her dress hung open just enough for Leia’s eyes to be drawn towards the shadow of her breasts, which Leia thought might be gilded with paint for exactly this purpose.

“I’m sorry, Leia, I don’t want to give you the wrong idea.” Honey concealed the best stingers. Leia met Qi’ra’s eyes again, saw her eyelashes (gilded) flutter in fake sympathy as she said, “We _are_ here to make a deal, not to flirt, after all.”

Leia scowled at her. “You said you had a deal. You know what I want?”

“You want resources,” Qi’ra said promptly, sitting back as if she had always been doing business. “Ships, food, medicine—everything it takes to run a government.”

Leia nodded silently. She hadn’t bothered hiding that; any crime lord worth the name would be able to figure it out based on who was contacting them, anyway.

“So here’s the deal.” Qi’ra’s smile showed more teeth than necessary, and did not reach her eyes. Leia felt that pressure again, dark Force energy coiling around her. “You may walk out of here freely, but I will offer you no aid. Or—” her eyes darkened, and her tongue slipped between her teeth, moistening her lips “—you may stay here with me for the length of a year, and your little Rebellion will get everything you have asked for, no further payment necessary.”

Leia stared at Qi’ra. She felt the Dark Side laughing as her anger warred with her sense of duty. Her cheeks were flushed, she knew it, and she didn’t care, not when she had just been offered such a preposterous deal. It was stupid and awful and she couldn’t just _walk away_ from the work she was doing. People relied on her. She was an integral part of the leadership of the Rebellion.

And, from Qi’ra’s smirk, the bloody Sith knew it, too.

“Would I be allowed to communicate with the Alliance?” Leia asked.

Only when she saw the satisfaction in Qi’ra’s face did Leia realise what the question meant. She had lost. Or won. Capitulated, either way. Qi’ra reached over the table and took Leia’s hand, stroking it with blaster-callused fingertips, and said, “My dear, you may not leave my side. But you may send messages, and even receive them—so long as they go through me, first.”

Leia narrowed her eyes, but did not pull her hand back. “Are you keeping my ship and my droid here too?”

“If they stay, it will be on lockdown.”

“Before I join you—” the words tasted bitter on her tongue “—I want to record one message there, beyond your eyes. Give me that, and I accept the rest.”

Qi’ra shook her hand. “It’s a deal,” she said, and Leia felt the jaws of time close around her, just like that.


	2. Chapter 2

“I made the deal,” Leia’s hologram said, terse, angry. Mon Mothma wasn’t sure if anyone else on the council had worked with her closely enough to notice that this Leia was the same one who had sat on the Senate: Young, angry, and full of fire masked with perfect elocution and manners so that all you saw was an ambitious young senator primed for great things. “You will get what we agreed to ask for.”

The pause after that statement stretched on long enough that the council’s murmurs of relief turned to worry. Mon Mothma gripped the edge of the table, and almost began asking Artoo if something was missing. Then Leia’s facade of calm broke, and she said, voice flat, anger finally clear: “I will be staying here. I am the price of this deal. Qi’ra wants me at her side for a year. I will have access to communications only through her will, and only with her screening. Do not send me any information you do not want Crimson Dawn to know. This message was not scanned, to my knowledge, but it is the last clean missive I will send until I come home.

“Do not worry about me. Qi’ra will take good care of me. She had made that quite clear.”

_What did she do?_ Mon studied Leia’s face. Very few things brought out that depth of feeling in her protege. _Did she—_

Mon’s thoughts were interrupted by Leia’s final words: “Do not attempt to bring me home early. I will learn everything I can from her, and tell you what I may upon my return.”

The hologram disappeared back into Artoo’s aperture.

In the silence filling the room, Mon Mothma closed her eyes and, for the first time in years, prayed.

*

After seeing Artoo off, Leia presented herself back in Qi’ra’s rooms, as requested. It had hurt, seeing Artoo fly _Hydenock_ away; he had complained, but no matter how argumentative Artoo was, defying a Sith wasn’t something he would do without some kind of plan. Leia was grateful for that, at least. The Alliance would understand.

Qi’ra barely looked at her as she returned before returning to her holopad. “There is a chest for your belongings. Acquaint yourself with this suite; it will be your home.”

Leia stiffened at Qi’ra’s terseness, but contented herself with a simple, “Very well.” The chest was visible as soon as she entered the door Qi’ra had indicated, which was clearly a bedroom. The chest was obvious: The one white object in the room, it stood out easily. The only other object quite so light was—

The second bed. Not the large one in the middle of the room, but the small one, not much larger than the _Falcon_’s bunks. It was gray, the frame made of steel and the bedding a range from charcoal to ash, embroidered with silver filigree. If you liked that kind of thing, it was lovely. It also stood out from the opulent ruby and opal tones of the rest of the room, making it very clear that these things and these things only belonged to Leia.

The rest, Leia knew, and it was a growing weight in her gut, belonged to Qi’ra.

And—the fact that she’d been trying to ignore, but now that her spare changes of clothing and small bag of toiletries had been stowed, could no longer avoid—so did she.

Leia looked at the bed, then the open door through which she could not see Qi’ra, and then sighed, took off her shoes, and curled up on the absurdly comfortable gray sheets. (Once, they would have seemed normal. Once, she had lived in a palace.) If she was small enough and still enough, Qi’ra would not notice. Qi’ra did not need to know the way she cried.

(Qi’ra would know if she cried regardless. Luke had always had an uncanny ability to show up when she needed comfort, and he hadn’t even had any training in the Force. Qi’ra did. Whatever she could do, it was sure to be more than what Luke was capable of. At least this way, she could pretend that Qi’ra didn’t know. She could pretend that she still had the sanctity of her mind.)

But Qi’ra did not come. Regardless of what she did or did not know, she didn’t appear. Leia couldn’t tell if that was a courtesy or simply that Qi’ra didn’t care. She appreciated it, either way, as her body slowly shook itself out and the tears started to dry on her cheeks. When her eyes cleared, Leia carefully sat up and walked into the refresher attached to Qi’ra’s bedroom. There, she washed her face and stared at the makeup stored around the sink. She hadn’t had access to that many products since—

Since Yavin, she supposed.

That had been the last time the Alliance had been on steady ground. The last time she’d been a full Senator, with all the rank and privileges that accorded. Trying to keep up any more makeup than occasionally hiding the shadows under her eyes or the bruises on her skin was... pointless, when she was a general leading soldiers who cared about her skills more than her appearance. But Qi’ra clearly had the time and means to present exactly how she chose: Flawless, sharp, and deadly in her beauty.

Leia did not touch the cosmetics. She pressed a washcloth against her face until the cold water leeched away the tear-brought red around her eyes. When she could look at herself and see naught but the polite smile politics had forced her to perfect, Leia scrunched the cloth in her hand. Very deliberately, she left it crumpled on the counter next to the sink. A single imperfection. A test, of sorts, to see how Qi’ra would respond when she noticed.

She did not tremble as she returned to the sitting room where Qi’ra waited. She did not lower her eyes as Qi’ra turned to look at her, gaze steady and appraising, like Leia was nothing to her but yet another object for her collection. Leia waited, refusing to tremble—whether from rage or fear—at the piercing attention. Qi’ra did not deserve such a sense of superiority.

“These are your duties,” Qi’ra said abruptly. She smiled, and it in no way reached her eyes. “You are to attend me as handmaiden. You will fetch what I ask for, stand silently with me at appropriate meetings, and otherwise do that which I ask of you. Is that understood?”

It wasn’t that different than many postings of her childhood, where Leia had trailed around Ministers to better understand their jobs. Then, the goal had been ensuring that she would not ask the impossible of them when she became queen, as well as learning what they could do for her even without being asked. This... Leia’s mouth felt sticky as she said, “I understand.”

“Good.” Qi’ra’s smile widened, star-white teeth glinting between blood-red lips. “You will address me at all times as ‘Lady’, ‘Mistress’, or ‘Ma’am’. Is that clear?”

“Completely, Lady Qi’ra.” There had to be an agenda behind offering her multiple options of title. Leia didn’t care; she had called so many nobles by their rank that it was meaningless, just another part of the person’s name once she knew what the title was. Leia kept her hands folded behind her; a soldier’s rest, not a politician’s. “May I have a guide to _First Light_?”

Qi’ra’s smile vanished, leaving nothing but the same stiletto-sharp contempt that Leia had first been greeted with. “You may not. I am led to believe you are intelligent and perceptive. You may use your own skills.”

Leia bowed silently, lips pressed tightly together. “May I explore, Lady Qi’ra?”

“No.”

It was a door slamming shut in her face. Leia’s fingernails bit into her palms, but she kept her face smooth. “I see,” she said, as blandly as she could.

Something tickled at her mind. Without thinking, Leia bared her teeth at Qi’ra. “Get _out_ of my head, Lady.”

Qi’ra laughed. “Clever girl indeed.”

The sense of intrusion faded, and Leia relaxed marginally. “If you say so, Lady.”

“I will tell you when I have need of you.” Qi’ra turned away. “Go rest for now.”

Leia bowed silently and retreated.

Qi’ra’s dismissal of Leia set the tone for the first weeks: Leia slept on a bed she thought felt too soft, woke up to the subconscious fear of Qi’ra forcing her awake, dressed in a veiled robe three shades darker and ten degrees plainer than Qi’ra’s outfit of the day, and followed her to a series of meetings. Most of them were via holocall, and half of those were privacy-screened such that Leia could see, but not hear, what was going on.

Sometimes during those meetings, Qi’ra would ask Leia to feed her by hand: Sweet fruits, usually, but sometimes nuts or little baked dainties that flaked and melted in her fingers. Those, Qi’ra sucked out of her fingers, either meeting Leia’s eyes directly or not deigning to look at her at all. It was the duty Leia hated the most; intimate and invasive and so very intentional. Naturally, Qi’ra found at least one opportunity a day to ask it of her.

Periodically Qi’ra would send her off to fetch something. A specific pastry. A pair of earrings. A paper book. A datapad. A security guard. Anything and everything, and it would be a single statement, where Qi’ra generally didn’t even look at her: “Go fetch a Vorsian Wind-Pipe.” No instruction about where it would be. Complete assumption that Leia already knew what it was.

Mostly, Leia used it as a time to explore, and at least attempt to befriend the others who lived and worked on _First Light_. Most of them, unfortunately, told her only exactly what information she asked for, and nothing more. She didn’t dare spend too much time wandering further than the items Qi’ra sent her after; if she took longer than Qi’ra believed reasonable, then when she returned she was subjected to an icy glare and a telepathic promise of later punishment. 

The first time, two weeks into her time on _First Light_, Qi’ra stripped her and placed her in a room no bigger than a closet, and left her there for twelve hours. No light. No food. No water. Just blank walls and her own body, straining for any scrap of light or sound, or even a texture other than the smooth wooden walls around her or her own flesh. The only kindness was that Qi’ra had allowed her to use the refresher beforehand, so that her body was empty; hunger was a lesser distraction than a full bladder.

She sat, eyes closed, practicing meditation as best she could for as long as she could. By the fourth hour, she had turned to the old prayers to the Force that her parents had taught her in secret, once she was old enough to keep the secret. The words (_The Force is with me; I am one with the Force_) were rote, mindless; they meant nothing by the fifth hour, when she let herself curl up, fetal and exhausted, in an attempt at sleep.

_Pretty girl,_ Qi’ra whispered in her mind, as her body drifted off. _You think you’re so good? You think you can cheat your punishment? _Wake up_, brat; the night is not over yet._

Leia curled tighter, breath coming fast and panicked, and tried to shout back in her own head: _I did not break for Vader; I will not break for you!_

Qi’ra simply laughed, and Leia felt an ethereal touch upon her face. She shuddered, and she couldn’t tell if it was from distaste or deep animal pleasure at anything _new_ on her skin, after so long. _Darth Vader is a hammer,_ Qi’ra murmured, and the touch stroked down her spine. _I am a scalpel. I do not need you to break for me._

The feeling withdrew, and Leia tried to chase it, because it was something _to_ chase, some proof that she wasn’t going to be stuck here forever. But her attempts, physical or mental, hit the same kind of wall: Smooth, unyielding, and just barely colder than her own skin.

Her cheek and back, where Qi’ra had... touched her, were warmer than the rest of her, and Leia drew another shuddering breath. She didn’t want to think about that touch. Or about how Qi’ra was the only person who had touched her at all in the past two weeks, dressing her and dragging her and shoving her into a closet, and now— now stroking her like a lover through the Force.

Leia pressed herself back against the room’s wall, forcing herself to focus on the pure physicality of that sensation; the hard wood behind her, the way her muscles tensed through her core and legs. “_Fuck,_” Leia said, as loudly and clearly as she could, because it _didn’t help at all_. Leia turned so that she was curled on her back instead, and continued talking to the air, because apparently Qi’ra was paying attention, at least sometimes, so she may as well give her a show.

It was only almost comfortable, lying on her back with her feet braced on the walls and her head just barely tucked into a corner. It only worked because she was so small. But she was naked, and she was thinking about Qi’ra’s touch, and she was thinking about other places Qi’ra could have touched her but didn’t. “I don’t know what your goal is,” Leia informed the empty space around her, listening for any faint echoes there might be. “But I doubt this was it.”

She let one of her hands press against her breast. It had been a long time since anyone else had touched her that way; since she had trusted anyone to do it and have it feel like anything other than an escape. Many nights, after long hours trying to keep the Alliance alive, she didn’t even have the energy to touch herself. Now she was well-rested, even if Qi’ra wanted to keep her up all of this night. Leia let herself moan as she squeezed her breast, as she hadn’t been able to for years in close Alliance quarters. It felt good to be able to make noise again.

“Would you touch me like this, if you could?” Leia asked. Her voice was turning breathy as she circled one fingernail around her nipple, a familiar heat building up under her skin as her nipple rose erect under her touch; she wished it were Qi’ra’s tongue, that she’d felt around her fingers often enough. An echo of that memory whispered against her fingers, cold where Qi’ra’s tongue was warm, and the added sensation made her gasp, made her aware of how her cunt was heating up.

“Would you use your hands?” She closed her eyes, though it didn’t much matter. She thought she could feel Qi’ra’s eyes on her, watching every movement of her fingers as one hand kept playing with her nipples. Leia let her other hand slowly move down her chest, fingernails light, trying to remember what Qi’ra’s fingernails felt like against her face, wondering what they’d feel like on her body. Her hand jerked down, nails digging deeper, and she whined at the phantom sensation of another hand on her wrist, another ghost-cold flash gone before she could even register it.

“Or would you use the Force?” Her hips jerked up to meet her fingers at the thought. Leia moaned as two of her fingers slid into place, trying to spread her legs further apart. They only pressed harder against the confining walls, and the thought _What if the Force held them there?_ whispered into Leia’s mind, arch and cold and so carefully uncaring that it was more Qi’ra’s voice than her own. Leia bit down on her lip, holding back the whine that was building in her throat, body arching up towards Qi’ra’s imagined presence.

“Would you touch me at all?” Fingers biting into her breasts, wishing they were teeth instead. “Or would you just stand there and watch?” The image pressed against her, Qi’ra dressed in sheer gold silk, more naked than if she were nude as it outlined every curve of her body, nipples erect and body utterly still save for her quick breaths. Her eyes bored into Leia’s, an insistent pressure that refused to let her stop moving. Leia hissed, and drove a third finger into her cunt, wishing—

It was never as good as having someone fuck her. But the idea that Qi’ra was watching, teasing her, asking her to pleasure herself while Qi’ra held her in place with the Force? She was so slick, and open, and every bare press of her fingers hummed through her body. Leia stopped trying to hold back her gasps and groans, the way her body squirmed closer to her fingers and frustrated wish of Qi’ra’s doubly-unpresent body.

It was still enough, especially when she thought about hearing Qi’ra say _Come for me_.

She couldn’t think anything, after that; just feel, as her body shook and her cunt squeezed tight over her fingers and pleasure blossomed through her.

When her body came to a rest, and her breathing evened out, Leia found herself slipping away to sleep once more.

This time, Qi’ra let her. Her last thought, as she drifted off, was _Does that mean she was watching after all?_ It was a warm thought, comforting, and Leia sleepily promised herself she’d think about why that was later.

*

Leia dreamed of ice. A beautiful winter lake, like those she’d seen in the Triplehorn Mountains of her youth. The sky was pristine, pale blue, and the equally-pristine lake reflected it perfectly, the ice sheeting almost invisible. Dark pines surrounded it, making the lake feel even more isolated than Leia knew it had to be. She stood, admiring the snow, and then took a single step towards the lake.

As she moved, the lake cracked. Leia froze in place. She hadn’t meant to do that. And stepping on the snow around a lake shouldn’t cause the ice itself to fracture. Behind her, over the now-audible grinding of the newly-cracked ice, she heard footsteps.

Slowly, Leia turned to see the visitor. She knew who it was even before she saw Qi’ra’s face; there was nobody else who would stand in her dreams like this, not now. She was wrapped in furs, whole skins of wolves and whitefangs covering her until the only part of her body visible was her head, and even then her dark hair was covered with frost.

“You bring fire,” Qi’ra said.

“Yes.” There was a long torch in her right hand. It looked like a captured sun. “It is hard to survive without it.”

Qi’ra stood beside her, looking out into the forest. “Not if you are bred to it.”

“But you weren’t.” Leia touches Qi’ra’s shoulder. No furs blocked her hand from reaching Qi’ra’s skin.

Qi’ra grabbed her wrist and faced her, the fangs of her slaughtered beasts framing her own snarl. “I am what I must be to survive.”

Leia met her eyes and reached for her face with her free hand. It was glowing, too, warm gold that melted the ice on Qi’ra’s eyes as she reached forward. “You will shatter if you stay like this.”

“And I will cut anyone who dares reach for me.”

But Qi’ra didn’t move away as Leia’s hand rested against her cheek, and nothing scratched at Leia’s flesh. Leia hesitated, then leaned in and kissed Qi’ra. As their lips met, Qi’ra surged forward and bit her, blood mingling with spit. Leia cried out into Qi’ra’s mouth, and Qi’ra pressed forward mercilessly until Leia slammed against a tree, hard bark scraping against her bare skin.

“You tempt me, princess,” Qi’ra hissed into her ear. “You cannot turn me from my wicked ways.”

Leia laughed. “I don’t want to turn you from them,” she told Qi’ra. She bared her teeth, and suddenly their positions were reversed: Leia, cloaked in wolf-cat robes, held Qi’ra against the tree by one hand against her bare chest. “I want to learn them from you.”

Qi’ra looked at her, and the surprise in her face felt more naked than her pale skin against the sky. She reached up and cupped Leia’s face in one hand, and the last thing Leia heard as she woke was, _Perhaps in time we can play this game, my princess._

*

When she woke, it was to Qi’ra opening the door to the closet, face impassive, and throwing a shapeless nightgown at her. “Dress and clean yourself,” Qi’ra snapped, turning away. “You are not fit to serve me, in this state.”

Leia smiled at her, making sure to show her teeth. “As you say, Lady Qi’ra. Where shall I find you to attend upon you, once I have made myself fit for service?”

“The Corusca Chamber.”

“Very well.” Leia slipped on the gown and curtsied in the formal Alderaani style. “I will be there anon.”

That earned her another icy look, but Qi’ra strode away in a billow of green. Leia followed, refusing to look at the ground. She had won something, last night, and she didn’t want to give that up. So she kept perfect pace, right until Qi’ra passed by the quarters they shared, and then slipped inside to take as fast a shower as she could—which was very fast, after years on spaceships and poorly outfitted bases.

The dress laid out on her bed was green, shading from deep green at the hem to the pale green of new leaves at the collar, with embroidery in russet and yellow picking out falling leaves. Qi’ra’s had been the same shades, but layered, and covered in gold-and-sapphire birds with emeralds for eyes. Three steps more ostentatious. Two steps further than any gown Leia would have considered proper for even the most formal occasion, as an Alderaani royal.

It was perhaps half an hour later that Leia strode into the Corusca Chamber, which she privately thought was showy even for Qi’ra—Corusca gems were dangerous to obtain, and pricy, and Qi’ra kept a whole room decorated for the Corusca gem chandelier hung in the center of its domed roof. It was all earth-and-fire colors, and if Qi’ra had been really thinking, she would be wearing warm colors to match it, or light blue and silver to contrast it, instead of greens which—while lovely—didn’t show off either the dress or the room to its best effect.

There was nobody else in the room, and though Leia was sure that Qi’ra had been tracking her progress, she still looked surprised when Leia swept in with all the dignity she had been raised to, and said, “Lady Qi’ra. You desired my presence?”

“You are my servant,” Qi’ra snapped. “Do not act like you are in control.”

Leia lifted a single eyebrow, which she had spent a full year teaching herself how to do as a child solely because it annoyed everyone she had the opportunity to deploy it on, and said, “Am I acting such? My apologies, Lady Qi’ra. I thought I was simply acknowledging that I have returned to my proper station.”

Qi’ra’s hand tightened, and Leia felt the air around her throat thicken. “You are a brat.”

“So I’m told, Lady.” Leia tilted her head up and forced herself to relax. “Is this another punishment? I thought that you wished for me to serve you.”

Qi’ra snarled and jerked her hand sideways, dragging Leia against a wall inlaid with petrified wood. “If you simply accepted that which I gave you, I would not need to do anything more.”

“I will never simply _accept_ torture,” Leia spat, forcing each word through the pressure on her chest and throat, ignoring how part of her was cataloging the sensation for whenever she had the chance to masturbate again. “I told you that last night.”

“You did, didn’t you.” The pressure relaxed slightly, just enough that Leia wasn’t struggling for breath anymore. “Do you know what it’s like to be shown every detail of what someone wishes from you, brat?” Qi’ra leaned forward, and Leia traced the shining gold of her eyeliner, which brightened the steel-blue of her eyes to something closer to sky.

Leia shook her head.

“That is what _you_ tried to do to me.” Qi’ra _tsked_, mock-sad, but her eyes were still cool as ice. “If I were not trained in the Force, I would have had no ability to keep you from doing whatever you wished to my mind. That’s dangerous, and cruel.”

“I didn’t mean to,” Leia said blankly. “I thought you’d only know if you were paying attention.”

“You—” Qi’ra’s hand dropped, and Leia locked her knees and leaned against the wall to keep herself from falling as the Force’s pressure vanished. “Ah, child,” Qi’ra murmured. “You have no idea, do you?”

“No idea of _what_?”

“You showed me your desire through the Force, princess,” Qi’ra snapped, color high on her cheeks. She strode over and grabbed Leia by the chin, as if Leia had anywhere else she wanted to look anyway. “Do you understand _that_?”

Leia froze, staring into Qi’ra’s dark, dilated eyes. “I— Really?” If true, that would explain several things about Bespin, though—Luke knowing they were in danger, and her knowing when and where he was hanging from its underside. “Oh.”

Qi’ra snorted, the least dignified noise Leia had heard from her this entire time, and relaxed her grip. “I’m not going to lie about the Force, idiot. It’s too powerful, and the possibilities are too interesting.”

“Will you train me?” Leia asked, before she could stop the thought. She’d ask Luke when she returned to the Alliance, if he wasn’t still off somewhere trying _his_ best to learn.

Qi’ra laughed. “Yes,” she said, and she pressed a kiss to Leia’s forehead (and there was a lipstick stain there now, Leia knew, blood to seal the pact). Qi’ra released her and beckoned, the Force tugging when Leia didn’t move fast enough behind the swirl of her dress. “Come, my apprentice. Let us begin.”

Leia followed. She had chosen this path, she told herself. Now, she just had to see it through.


	3. Chapter 3

_Dearest Mon,_

_It’s interesting here. I’m sure that when I return to the Alliance I’ll rue how soft I’ve allowed myself to get, sleeping on true mattresses and enjoying showers where I don’t need to worry about sharing hot water, but I’ve come to no harm. I don’t believe I will come to any harm in the remaining months, either._

_Qi’ra knows I’m writing this. She tells me to say that she’s taking perfectly good care of me, and she calls me your cherub. I’m fairly certain she’s laughing at me, when she calls me that. But as harsh as she seemed when we first met, I think after the first month we’ve become something akin to friends. At least, she’s been showing me some of her tricks, and helping me understand syndicate politics. I believe that may be of some use, once I return._

_Is Luke around? If he isn’t, do you know how to pass a message on to him? There’s something I’d like to speak with him about, when I return._

_I hope that our myriad friends remain safe under the constellations; pass on my well-wishes as you are able._

_Fondly, as ever,_

_Leia_

Mon Mothma sat back in her chair and frowned at the message. It was unmistakably Leia’s writing, and she truly was in no danger. Leia’s code-phrases hadn’t changed since she and Bail had set them up in her childhood, and Mon doubted that Qi’ra could force her to use them—or implant them in the message herself—without leaving some tell.

Unless the tell was simply that this was the first message that Leia had sent in three months, and it was encrypted and sent solely to her.

“What are you up to, dear one?” Mon murmured, staring at the softly glowing text on her holopad. “And how much danger are you truly in?”

Luke was out on a mission, working with a team to acquire more fuel. He would likely be out of contact still for several days, but Mon pulled up another screen and began typing.

_Check in as soon as you have a chance. Our chinar tree has some strange markings I’d like you to take a look at._

Mon let it encrypt and sent it on its way; hopefully Luke would be able to better understand the strange feeling surrounding the message.

Until then, Mon pushed her worry away. There was other work to be done, where she had more hope of accomplishing something of value than by worrying about Leia.

*

Leia focused through her hand, reaching out mentally for the flowers Qi’ra had scattered across the table in the atrium. She was to pick them up without touching them with her body, and arrange them without breaking a single stem. There were thirty stems; many with multiple blooms, all of them delicate. Right now, she was focusing on a midnight blue nova lily shot through with golden veins, imagining how it would feel to wrap her fingers around it and place it in the vase.

Unfortunately, nothing was happening. This strategy had worked when Qi’ra had set her to stacking engraved wooden disks last week, but every time it felt like she was getting close with the flowers, Leia could feel the slender stem bend underneath her spectral hands. To lift it would be to bruise, if not break, the stem. If she kept her eyes open—which she’d finally mastered, after weeks of needing her eyes closed to do even the smallest thing with the Force—she could see the leaves and petals flutter, and that was, in many ways, more frustrating than if she were doing nothing at all.

Leia breathed, and relaxed her fingers. This wasn’t working. Trying to continue after ten attempts had all ended the same way would lead her nowhere. She had to change her approach. Leia looked at the colorful sprays, delicate and graceful and—

“Not all the same,” she murmured. Leia smiled, and closed her eyes for a moment to focus herself. This time, when she spread her hand out, it wasn’t to pluck the lily; it was to trace it in her mind, finding every vein, until she could feel the Force running through every fading cell. Leia opened her eyes, and the nova lily looked like it was almost aglow as she lifted her hand and brought the lily with it, turning it gently until she could place it in the vase.

As soon as the cut stem touched water, Leia could feel the lily begin to soak it up, pleasure suffusing the plant and flow back into Leia’s body as well. Leia drew in a quick breath, and broke her connection to the lily instinctively. The residual effect still lingered, a cool wash through her nerves, lingering across her chest and down into her stomach. Leia felt her nipples tighten, and breathed through the sensation. She didn’t need this right now. It was just a distraction from the task at hand.

Methodically, Leia reached out to each of the other flowers, lifting them as a whole unit and trying not to connect as deeply as she had with the first one. Despite her care, each time a flower dipped into the water she felt it coil through her body, teasing her. Leia kept her attention on the Force and the flowers, not the wet heat of her cunt. It was extraneous, just like all the other thoughts she pushed out of her mind—except for the vicious thought in the back of her mind about what Qi’ra’s goal with this task had even been.

Or, more accurately: As she moved the flowers, each one more surely than the last, Leia wondered if arousal had been part of Qi’ra’s plan, or just an enjoyable side effect.

Leia wouldn’t put it past her Sith master to be using this as a slow and subtle revenge for how Leia had first used her Force powers. It wasn’t quite as frustrating as the way Qi’ra asked her to be silently present for every single meeting with undercover Imperial agents. There, she was allowed to do nothing—except for listening to Qi’ra deal with them, offering them top-of-the-line weapons in exchange for more credits than anyone in the Alliance had had for years. It was infuriating, and Qi’ra knew it, and now Leia could sense the bone-deep satisfaction that warmed Qi’ra’s heart every time Leia forced down another scowl or kept herself from reaching for a blaster to rid the galaxy of another greedy Imperial. 

The last bloom settled into place, and Leia relaxed. She had completed the task and it can only taken her— Leia checked her chrono, which she’d deliberately placed behind her so that she wouldn’t get as impatient. “Three fucking hours,” Leia muttered. She rubbed her forehead, and strapped the chrono back around her wrist. “This would’ve taken me ten minutes by hand,” she told the room. She wasn’t sure where Qi’ra was, but the Sith lady was somewhere nearby, and if she was near enough for Leia to sense her, then she was definitely listening in.

“But if you’d done it by hand, you wouldn’t have learned nearly so much.” Qi’ra emerged from a side room where Leia was rarely allowed, for unstated reasons that Leia suspected mostly boiled down to Qi’ra wanting to do sensitive work undisturbed. “Though I did not expect such a lack of composure to result from this task.”

Leia resisted the urge to snarl at how Qi’ra’s eyes trailed down her body, lingering at her erect nipples. “Didn’t you? It felt like something you would do intentionally.”

Qi’ra raised one impeccably groomed eyebrow. “Are you accusing me of lying, apprentice?”

“That’s what you do.” Leia crossed her arms over her chest, blocking Qi’ra’s view. “Politics are elaborate lies. Sith work through misdirection. Smugglers live for half-truths.”

“Oh, my dear.” Qi’ra glided closer, her shimmering orange-and-gold gown glimmering like fire as she moved around the aesthetically arranged chairs nobody ever sat in. Her long nails, inset with garnets, glinted in the light. Leia held herself perfectly still, transfixed, as Qi’ra brought one hand up to caress her cheek. Her skin burned where the skin touched, and Leia could feel the sharp edge of those nails just beneath her eye. “That doesn’t mean I would always lie to _you_. Our relationship is founded on fundamental truths, is it not?”

Leia kept her voice very even as she said, “That is true.”

“Then why do you worry, little jewel?” Qi’ra’s blinked slowly as Leia refused to look away. Something touched her, an insect-tickle trailing down her spine. Leia stood statue-still, meeting the test as Qi’ra’s thumb stroked back and forth on her cheek, the tip of her nail brushing her eyelashes. “I do not desire to alienate a loyal apprentice.”

Her thumb was moving lower, towards her lips, and Leia finally twitched at the first touch of thumb to the corner of her mouth. Minute as the movement was, Qi’ra noticed, and her own lips curved into a smile. Leia glared and deliberately stepped back, shoving against Qi’ra with the Force, powering it with all her anger at Qi’ra’s endless teasing. Qi’ra staggered back: One, two, three paces, until she caught up against a chair and fell into it, the fabric of her dress stretching tight against her skin as Leia kept pressing against it with her rage.

Qi’ra’s wide eyes darkened, and Leia snarled outright, stepping forward, hand still splayed as she focused the Force through it. She could feel Qi’ra trying to push her back, but all her training and practice meant nothing against Leia’s rage-fueled power. “_Stop it_,” Leia growled as she advanced. “I don’t _care_ about your petty little lies. Build power however you wish. It doesn’t matter. But, by the stars, _stop denying you want to fuck me_.”

The reciprocal pressure vanished. Leia watched Qi’ra’s chest rise and fall. Clinically, she observed that the Force she was using wasn’t enough to crack Qi’ra’s ribs, or prevent her from breathing. Or speaking. But as Qi’ra tried to raise a hand, Leia slapped it back down against the plush chair’s arm. Qi’ra laughed, then, and said, “When have I ever denied that?”

“Then fuck me.” Leia narrowed her eyes. The Force was whispering to her, deep in her heart; all the rage blossoming into a glorious well of power. “Or maybe, since you won’t start—” Leia opened herself to it, and let it guide her as she drove into Qi’ra. One hand on Qi’ra’s perfect fucking cheekbone, messing up her makeup, and Leia broke through Qi’ra’s carefully constructed mental defenses with a single thrust. “Maybe I’ll fuck _you_.”

Qi’ra’s mind spread out before her: Cold and calculating, a frozen pool open to the stars. Fish swam in the pool, each one representing a force under Qi’ra’s command. Each constellation was a reminder of a power Qi’ra had to keep track of, something that she one day wanted to rule. Those places she already controlled glistened in the pool, candles on the ice. And, as Leia looked around, she saw herself, a blazing fire on the water’s edge. The fire warmed, the fire promised destruction, and the frosted pool wanted nothing more than to touch it and see which would engulf the other.

Leia hissed, startled; she knew this scene, she’d dreamed of it in Qi’ra’s fucking closet. _That was you?_

_Of course it was me,_ Qi’ra snapped, her inner voice the crack of a thawing river. _I thought you knew it was a true dream!_

The fire crept closer to the ice, and Leia took a deep breath, calming herself, stilling the fire for the moment. _Then how about we play this game now, Qi’ra?_

The stars flickered, dimming against imminent sunrise. _You are but half-trained at best. We are not playing in our minds._

_I want to claim you._ Leia could hear the unrelenting heat of a summer sun in her voice, feel it weigh heavy on Qi’ra’s chill. _Tell me: What is your desire?_

Leia gasped as Qi’ra twisted against the Force and Leia’s weight alike. Leia spared half a thought for their bodies, and moved herself until she knelt astride Qi’ra. Her cunt ached, and it was a simple enough matter to press into Qi’ra with her own body and the Force, until Qi’ra broke, her moan half a scream.

_I will fight you,_ Qi’ra gasped, but the sun spread over the winter lake as Leia felt her desire rise to meet Leia’s own. Icy fingers of the Force prickled against Leia’s body, and she shivered, letting Qi’ra draw her out of the Force. The cold felt _good_ against her overheated skin, biting into her breasts and clawing into her cunt, and Leia let her eyes slip closed in the pleasure of it.

Then Qi’ra leaned forward and bit her shoulder, hard enough to make Leia’s body stutter as she screamed, pain ricocheting through the Corusca gems and sending them chiming. She heard Qi’ra laugh, distantly, as the Force roared inside her, shoving Qi’ra off her shoulder, halting the bleeding even as Leia faced Qi’ra’s giddy bloody-toothed grin. The Force pinned her, kept her still as Leia’s eyes focused once more. The Force coaxed the pain into pleasure, and cried out through her with the strength of a solar flare, “This is my birthright! You are simply another step on my path, and when I am done you will be _nothing_ before me!”

“I am not nothing,” Qi’ra hissed. Needles slid through the Force, picking apart the bindings faster than Leia could reinforce them. “I broke everyone else in my way, and I can tear _you_ apart too.” Qi’ra dug her fingers over Leia’s ass, sharp fingernails piercing her flesh even through her thin gown. Leia shouted, hand spasming open at the pain. The Force sang in her blood, and she felt it well up over Qi’ra’s fingers, fire-hot against her skin. Leia _reached_, seizing hold of the Force and snapping Qi’ra’s hands back against the chair, pinning her.

The Force swept through her, and it felt better than sex; lightning in her veins, thrumming against not just her physical form but also every pleasure center in her mind. Leia held Qi’ra in place (she thrust forward, Force and body both struggling as Leia kept careful rein on the too-big swelling in side of her that didn’t just want to hold but _crush_ her opponent) and carefully stepped back off her lap, back onto the solid floor. She smiled, a purely physical pleasure settling heavy in her chest as she saw Qi’ra stuck, at her mercy.

“Can you still fight me?” Leia tilted her head. She thought she could feel her hair coiling around her, the Force coursing through her allowing it to run beautiful and wild. “Or has the student surpassed the master already?”

The moment Leia loosened her hold enough that Qi’ra might be able to respond, she smiled, teeth sharp and bloody, and spat at her. The spit made it a bare inch from Qi’ra’s mouth, and Leia sighed. “Try again.”

This time, the response came roaring through the Force, cold and drowning: _You have only power, little princess. My tricks will yet prevail._

Leia chuckled, and reached out with the Force to caress Qi’ra’s face. _We will see,_ she told Qi’ra, letting her Force-voice bite down Qi’ra’s throat, using each word like a dagger to pin Qi’ra down. _I don’t think I need to touch you with my body at all. This will be more than enough for us both, will it not?_

“Fuck you,” Qi’ra gasped out, as Leia stroked across her beautiful dress with the Force, watching the fabric ripple in its passage. “I’m going to tear you apart when you let me go.”

With each of Qi’ra’s attempts to break free by Force and body, Leia could feel Qi’ra’s body heat, melting her until the peaks of her nipples showed and her pussy smelled like sex. Leia narrowed her eyes and pressed closer, letting Qi’ra feel her own arousal, the way her thighs slid against each other as she stepped forward. “That doesn’t sound like an incentive for letting you go anytime soon,” she remarked, and she heard the Force burning at the edge of her voice, cutting into Qi’ra’s chest with every word she spoke and making her writhe. “But then, I hadn’t intended to do that anyway.”

“Let me do _something_!”

Leia looked at her, at the blood drying on her lips and the sweat darkening her dress, at her hair slowly flying free of her careful bun. The Force looked through her and whispered _This is how you take her apart_ in the deepest recesses of Leia’s heart, and then she said, “Okay.”

She let go.

The Force flew around her, her own personal whirlwind that encased both of them, but Leia pulled back on Qi’ra until nothing held her down. The whimper that escaped Qi’ra’s mouth as she was released belied the fervor with which she’d asked for freedom. Leia laid a single hand, shrouded in the Force, upon Qi’ra’s chest, and held her down with nothing more than the purely human weight of it. “Is this what you wanted?” Leia asked, as little Force-tendrils stroked Qi’ra’s body of their own volition. “Or do you miss it wrapping around you and holding you, keeping you safe?”

Slowly, Qi’ra raised her own hand, and it wavered beside Leia’s head for a minute before snapping towards her cheek. Leia didn’t flinch as the Force caught Qi’ra’s hand millimeters away from her skin. Qi’ra growled, and tugged at her hand, but it didn’t move. Leia turned toward the hand, now that Qi’ra understood that the Force would not allow her to be harmed. Leia kissed Qi’ra’s palm, allowed the most minute caress in return, and then gestured. Qi’ra’s hand snapped to the chair, phantom bruises almost but not quite like fingerprints on her wrist.

“You had no training,” Qi’ra said faintly. “How are you doing this?”

“The Force seems to like me,” Leia said, because that was the only understanding she had. The Force was purring against her, vibrating softly inside her skin. It felt too big for her, like it was going to explode out of her if given a chance, instead of flowing out in a half-directed stream against Qi’ra. “And it knows what I want, and wants to give it to me.”

“The Force isn’t _alive_,” Qi’ra insisted, but the fractal fractures spiralling through the frozen pool of her Force-heart showed her doubts. “It’s merely a tool!”

The Force crackled around Leia, lightning and storm. She traced her Force-limned hand across Qi’ra’s bones, following the paths of her ribs. “The Force is made of life.” She could see darker patches across Qi’ra’s skin, and she moved from bones to them, pressing against old scars and feeling Qi’ra tremble as she felt the nerves alight as they hadn’t done in years upon years. “Does that not make it alive?”

“It isn’t sentient, then.” Qi’ra grabbed Leia’s wrist, drawing her away from the oldest wound Leia could see, lamprey-teeth on her thigh, panic citrus-bright in the air around her. “Don’t.” As her fingers closed around Leia’s wrist, the panic changed to confusion, shock rippling through her flesh and into Leia’s like the first taste of whiskey burning against her throat.

“I don’t want to dig into your past,” Leia said mildly, allowing Qi’ra to move her hand. Her other hand slid onto Qi’ra’s chiffon-covered stomach and rested there, soft for the moment. “I just want to dig into _you_.”

Fear flared for a bare moment, sunlight on new snow, before being replaced by a feral grin, deep and rich as autumn leaves. Qi’ra’s fingers dug into Leia’s wrist, fingernails needle-sharp and painless against the Force’s euphoria even as blood began to sprout red around her nails. “Are you sure you’ll be the one doing the digging?” Qi’ra asked, breathless, the Force trickling through her veins and doing nothing to dampen Leia’s blaze when they met; instead it urged her on, an icy front burning off in a near-visible mist between their bodies.

Leia pressed her hand into Qi’ra’s stomach, and the Force crackled, electricity buzzing into Qir’a, burning Lichtenberg lines into the expensive fabric as it cascaded across Qi’ra’s body. Not enough to _damage_ her; just enough to _hurt_. The power rushing through her felt like stars alighting in her flesh, bright and loud and perfect as the first debate she’d won or the exhausted exuberant exhilaration that coursed through Yavin IV after the Death Star exploded. Leia sighed, leaning into the Force, which met her and buzzed against her, better than any lover’s touch.

Qi’ra’s muscles contracted, and she writhed beneath Leia’s hand, gasping. In the Force, she was luminescent; the Force showed Leia every single nerve in Qi’ra’s body and how they lit up at Leia’s touch, at the lightning’s touch, at the Force’s touch. Pleasure twisted itself around pain, and Qi’ra’s body was a harp for Leia to play, and even as she screamed the Force resonated between them, rapturous.

Leia pulled herself back into her body just enough to smile and say, with the full glory of the Force in her breath, “Yes.”

The Force guided her, electricity jumping between her fingers and coiling through her hair like another strand of her braids. It thrilled through her, pressing into her even as she methodically took Qi’ra apart with the Force alone. She didn’t touch Qi’ra; she just let the Force hold her up, spreading her out in the air, and thrust into her, against her. The taste of Qi’ra’s pleasure filled Leia, chocolate heavy in her mouth and warm wind wrapping fiercely around her skin, molding itself to her body like a second (_third_, said the Force) skin.

Each frisson of pleasure across Qi’ra’s body resonated through Leia’s, building deep in her body, filling a hole she hadn’t even known existed. She drank it in, eyes seeing Qi’ra’s body wrapped in flame-colored cloth, every pulse of blood running through her body with each cell a different spark, and the broken pond slowing boiling in the Force.

The fire in her core roared, consuming everything it saw, lightning-sparked and gorgeous, burning through her body, _becoming_ her body until there was nothing left but the blue-white light coursing through her and connecting her to every other being in the galaxy, beautiful and brilliant. Leia cried out as pleasure broke, the fire collapsing in on itself in a supernova that exploded through her, wringing everything from her as she fell to her knees on the cold atrium floor.

In front of her, distantly, she heard Qi’ra fall as well. Limp, but still breathing. Stinking of sweat and sex and scorched cloth. Leia braced her hands on the floor and reached out, cautiously—

_The stars sing, flutes and clarinets weaving into a bright chorus. Every ship’s engine is a different single string on a harp. The little lives of each planet were symphonies of their own, becoming grand orchestras together. In the midst, a single gong sounded, deep and bright and confident, and something turned to look, and—_

Leia pulled herself out again, shaking, now sweat-covered as she hadn’t been before. The last aftershocks of her orgasm pulsed through her, messy and physical and even with the clothing she’d been wearing she could feel her thighs wet halfway to her knees. She lowered herself to the carpet and closed her eyes. She’d just rest for a little bit. The floor was more comfortable than many places she’d slept, with the Alliance.

When she woke, she was in Qi’ra’s bed, decadent and consuming, and Qi’ra was lying next to her. Leia stared at her, realised she didn’t feel sticky anymore, and then, before she could consider anything else, fell back asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

_Mon,_

_Qi’ra is releasing me early. I have honored the terms of her bargain more than well enough, she says. Send a ship to the attached coordinates._

_I’ll see you soon. Perhaps we’ll finally have a chance to sail on the Silver Sea, and discuss these circumstances further._

_— Leia_

Mon Mothma scowled. It was undeniably Leia, brusque as it was. It had been six months in total since Leia first left; only half the time that the initial bargain had been for, and absolutely nothing in any of her previous sparse messages had sounded like Qi’ra was inclined towards allowing Leia to leave any time soon.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair, then sent a message over _Home One_’s internal net. While she waited, she studied the coordinates. Dathomir wasn’t her favorite planet; it was fiercely independent and the Jedi she’d known before the Empire’s rise had mentioned something about strange dark Force users living there. She hadn’t inquired further; it wasn’t any of her business, especially with the growing war.

Now, with the Jedi gone, she wished she’d understood more about it. Maybe some of those Force users weren’t as bad as the Jedi had thought; they could use more Jedi to combat Darth Vader and the Emperor. Luke was a lovely boy, and he learned quickly, but compared to the old Jedi Order... he was so far behind the Jedi generals she’d known.

Her door buzzed, and Mon said, “Enter.”

Luke came through, striding with purpose, much older than when they’d first met in ways the years alone couldn’t explain. “You said Leia sent a message?”

“Yes.” Mon flipped the display so that Luke could read it. “Do you believe she’s being truthful?”

“I think...” Luke frowned, eyes slipping closed. “It’s not a trap.”

The tension in Mon’s heart eased slightly. “Anything else?”

Luke waved a hand in a clear _just a moment_. The lines in his face deepened, then disappeared as his mouth slipped open slightly. No matter how many times Mon had seen him reach into the Force, it never failed to disconcert her. It was almost, but not quite, the same as the Jedi of old, and sometimes she could swear there was a high-pitched noise just on the edge of her hearing when he was deep in the Force.

Suddenly his eyes snapped open. “Oh,” he said, faintly, face pale. “That explains a lot.”

“Luke?”

“Leia’s fine. She’s telling the truth.” Luke looked away, rubbing the join of his prosthetic. “I need to talk to her.”

“Pick a crew,” Mon said, weary. If neither of them were going to explain anything to her, then she had to divorce herself from this nonsense before her feelings entrenched further. “Go to Dathomir. And, please—” she reached over her desk and touched his arm, drawing his eerie blue gaze once more “—I want an explanation, when you come home.”

Luke looked at her, silent, eyes too intense to be human, and then something shifted and they were just bright sky blue again. “I’ll do that.”

And then he left, just like that. Mon closed her eyes and breathed a prayer, then typed a single-word message back to Leia: _Acknowledged._

It would be enough.

It had to be.

*

Leia looked out at the planet slowly spinning beneath them. “I don’t need to go back.”

“There’s nothing to gain by keeping you here.” Qi’ra slid her arms around Leia from behind, pressing a kiss to the nape of her neck. Leia ignored her; there was no time for sex, as Qi’ra so clearly wanted from the deep ripples lapping at her in the Force. “You’re much more valuable out there, as an ally.”

“The only reason you’re sending me away is that you don’t want to lose Crimson Dawn to me.”

Qi’ra bristled, stepping away, but the Force told a different story. It laughed softly in Leia’s ears, whispered that Qi’ra feared her even as she desired her, worshipped her. Leia reached out and froze Qi’ra in place, then turned from the window and stepped in front of her once-captor. Quietly, she tucked a loose strand of hair behind Qi’ra’s ear. “I will not forget you,” she murmured, and pressed a kiss to Qi’ra’s forehead, leaving a fake-bloody stain behind. “You taught me many useful things.”

“Leia—”

She liked how her name sounded when Qi’ra said it, broken and gutterral. Leia stroked Qi’ra’s throat. “Yes?”

“Will I see you again?”

Distantly, Leia felt the windstorm swirl and brassy gong she’d learned meant _Luke Skywalker_ in the Force. She pulled the Force back into herself, covering its bonfire blaze with a quiet shadow, and releasing Qi’ra. “I’m sure you will,” Leia said, and she drew Qi’ra into a deep kiss, biting down until she tasted blood and felt Qi’ra’s muscles flutter as she forced herself to stay upright. Leia drew her mouth back, then, just enough to smile. “I’d miss being able to play with you, after all.”

Before Qi’ra found her words again, Leia strode away in a flutter of cloth: White, with golden clouds and a blood-red sun, silver and black birds silhouetted against it. It was time to see Luke, and meet his reckoning. She could already taste him, honey-sweet in the back of her throat, the distant buzz of wings as the Force whispered of a threat not yet unsheathed, but willing and present should the need arise.

Leia smiled as she waited in the docking bay for Luke’s favorite cruiser, _Krayt_, to settle. He would not come alone, but he would see her first alone, to sate his fears.

She didn’t know if seeing her truly would help.

The ship hissed, and the landing ramp opened, and Luke stood there, black-dressed and silent against the interior lights.

Leia stepped onto the ramp, and the sound echoed through the chamber. “I had hoped you’d come,” she said, smiling. A sun pulsed in her chest, echoing the one in Luke’s. “I didn’t dare ask, because I had no way of knowing if you were near Mon, but I still hoped.”

“Leia...” Luke sighed, and shifted, and now she could see his face, eyes bright and sad. “What did you do?”

She stepped past him, into the ship, and heard the distant chatter of the squad he’d brought with him. “I learned the lessons offered to me. Would you have done differently?”

Leia couldn’t see his face, but she could feel his slow sadness, wounds that had yet to heal. “No,” he admitted, and she felt how it tore him apart to know that. “I would have listened too.”

She turned, and met his eyes, kyber-bright. Without moving a muscle, she hit the ramp controls, and it began closing behind them. “I’ll teach you what I know,” she said, as his heart hammered fear-fast against her Force-enhanced senses. “And in exchange, you’ll help me build a lightsaber.”

At last, Luke smiled, and Leia saw something of the krayt dragon he’d named his ship for in that look. “Will you join me on the front lines, once you have it?”

“We’ll face them together,” Leia said, and with each word the Force soared within her, joyous and hungry. “And, together, we shall win.”

The shadows in Luke’s heart deepened, but he nodded, and led her back inside as _Krayt_’s engine powered up, taking them back home to what Leia knew had to be their shared destiny. The Force sang inside her, its flame fed by Luke’s wind, spiralling to greater heights. _Together_, she promised herself, _we will reclaim the galaxy together._

**Author's Note:**

> _Love comes with a knife, not some shy question,  
and not with fears for its reputation_.
> 
> _I say these things disinterestedly.  
Accept them in kind_.
> 
> _[...]_
> 
> _You must dive naked under and deeper under,  
a thousand times deeper. Love flows down_.
> 
> _The ground submits to the sky and suffers what comes.  
Tell me, is the earth worse for giving in like that?_
> 
> _[...]_
> 
> _I have no more words. Let the soul speak  
with the silent articulation of a face_.
> 
> — Rumi, trans. Coleman Barks  
(_Rumi: The Big Red Book_, pages 20-21)


End file.
